Geraniums are beautiful plants that you can grow in your home, but they require special care to survive. These easy steps will help ensure the spread of these incredible flowers. Keep reading and learn how to propagate your own scented geraniums!
Geraniums are a popular plant that can be propagated by cuttings. They will also propagate through seeds, but the process is much more difficult. To propagate geraniums, you can put them in water and let them sit for about an hour. After an hour, the roots should have grown enough to be able to stick out of the water. Then, you can remove the geranium from the water and place it in soil.
Scented Geraniums are different from garden geraniums
Scented Geraniums are a great choice for the gardener who wants a lot of bang for their buck. Purchasing three scented geraniums can yield 9 or more plants for next year’s garden.
When buying your scented geraniums, don’t be fooled by the name. They are different from the garden geranium we buy at our local garden center known for their colorful flowers. Scented geraniums are tender perennials from the pelargonium family.
How to Propagate Scented Geraniums
Propagating scented geraniums is surprisingly easy and requires very little expense and no fancy equipment. In fact, some gardeners have good luck by simply breaking off a stem and planting it in the same pot with the parent plant. However, if you want to be more deliberate with a higher chance of success, here are simple steps for growing scented geraniums from cuttings.
Here’s how to propagate scented geraniums from cuttings.
Choose a healthy, disease free stem with no flowers. Cut above a leaf node, making sure the resulting cutting will have at least 3 leaf nodes remaining.
While you’re at it, take multiple cuttings, just in case some of the cutting will fail to root or die before becoming established.
Next, you should remove the lower leaves from the end of the cutting, so that no leaves are buried underneath the potting medium.
For the potting medium, choose a well-draining mix that contains peat-free compost and sand or perlite.
Water the cutting, but don’t drown it in water and place it in a warm, partly sunny spot but make sure the sun is not too strong. If the sun is too strong, it’s best to keep the cutting in indirect light.
Water whenever the soil starts to dry out.
Some gardeners will cover the cutting with a plastic on which they poke some holes to let the air circulate, but your scented geranium cuttings will root even without creating a greenhouse effect.
Alternatively, you can choose to root geranium cuttings in water too, although I find that rooting in potting mix is a more dependable option.
You can also use rooting hormone on the end of the cutting, but you can root the cutting even without it.
Scented Geraniums Varieties to Grow
There are dozens and dozens of scented geraniums with an array of fragrances and flavor. Varieties are commonly categorized by their scents such as rose, mint, lemon, orange, apple, and chocolate.